1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an electrophotographic image forming process and image forming apparatus that can produce a high-quality electrophotographic print which has high gloss, less unevenness in image and high image quality close to silver halide photographic image quality, has texture equivalent to that of silver halide photographs and invites less curling and to such an electrophotographic print produced by the image forming process.
2. Description of the Related Art
Electrophotography is an image forming process in which a latent electrostatic image is formed on a photoconductor as a result of photoconduction and colored charged fine particles (a toner) are applied to the latent electrostatic image by action of electrostatic force to thereby form a visible image (toner image). Various attempts have been made to produce images with quality close or equivalent to that of silver halide photographs.
For example, Japanese Patent Application Publications (JP-B) No. 04-31389 and No. 04-31393 each disclose a method and an apparatus for improving image quality, in which a sheet is placed on a toner-image-bearing surface of a support bearing a fixed toner image, the resulting article is hot-pressed again to thereby fuse the toner image again, the fused toner image is cooled, and the support is removed from the sheet to thereby yield a toner image with appropriate gloss, high density, and optical transparency.
Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open (JP-A) No. 04-51156 proposes an image processing method in which a toner image is formed on a transparent image-receiving layer on a support, and the toner image is then embedded in the image-receiving layer.
JP-A No. 04-501925 proposes an image processing method in which an image-receiving paper (sheet) having a support, a thermoplastic resin layer on one side of the support, and an anti-curling layer arranged on the other side is used, and a toner image formed on the thermoplastic resin layer is brought into contact with a web, is heated and pressurized at a temperature equal to or higher than the glass transition point Tg of the thermoplastic resin, is cooled, and is removed from the web.
JP-A No. 08-211645 proposes an electrophotographic image-receiving sheet including a toner-image-receiving layer, a thermoplastic polymer layer, raw paper, a thermoplastic polymer layer, and an antistatic layer.
JP-A No. 2002-91048 discloses an electrophotographic image transfer sheet and a color image forming apparatus using the sheet. The examples thereof mention that a double-sided resin coated paper is cooled and released using a fixing belt.
However, the techniques disclosed in JP-B No. 04-31389, JP-B No. 04-31393, and JP-A No. 04-51156 do not use an electrophotographic image-receiving sheet including a support having a polyolefin resin layer at least on one side thereof, and the resulting print has insufficient smoothness and gloss and fails to have image quality close to silver halide photographic image quality.
The thermoplastic image-receiving layer directly arranged on a support disclosed in JP-A No. 04-501925 is affected by unevenness of the support, thereby has decreased surface smoothness and fails to yield image quality close to silver halide photographic image quality. In addition, the anti-curling layer does not effectively inhibit curling.
JP-A No. 08-211645 fails to teach a cooling and releasing process, and the resulting image has unevenness and fails to have gloss equivalent to silver halide photographs. In addition, this technique is not directed to inhibit curling.
JP-A No. 2002-91048 does not refer to inhibition of curling, and the technique disclosed therein cannot produce a print with high image quality close to silver halide photographic image quality with less curling.